“Come, come, Bob, enough of that. They are a little soreish, but nothing to what they would have been had you not stopped them. But, I say, what is this secret? I’m dying to know. My dear boy, you’ve no idea how you looked when you were spouting like that. You made my flesh creep, I assure you. Come, out with it; what’s the secret?”
I felt, and no doubt looked, somewhat confused.
“Do you know, Jack,” said I, solemnly, “I have no secret whatever!”
Jack gasped and stared—
“No secret, Bob!”
“Not the most distant shadow of one.”
Jack pulled out his watch, and said in a low voice—
“Bob, my boy, we have just got about three-quarters of an hour to live. When these villains come back, and find that you’ve been humbugging them, they’ll brain us on the spot, as sure as my name is John Brown and yours is Robert Smith—romantic names, both of ’em; especially when associated with the little romance in which we are now involved. Ha! ha! ha!”
I shrank back from my friend with the terrible dread, which had more than once crossed my mind, that he was going mad.
“Oh, Jack, don’t laugh, pray. Could we not invent some secret to tell them?”